One of the benefits of being in a book club is reading a variety of genres, some of which perhaps you wouldn’t gravitate towards left to your own desires.

Not a watcher of Dr. Who, not a lover of sci-fi in general (ha! and not sure this is in the sci-fi category), this was a challenge and I often did not know what was going on. What I did find was the love story buried in the time travel of it all.

The settings are the near future United Kingdom and an Arctic expedition in the 1800’s. As people are extracted from the past, they are guided in the present by a “bridge” to help them navigate the culture shock. It’s this “expat” and “bridge” that are the beating heart of the story.

Whatever the time, the questions to humanity are the same: How do we manage scarcity? How do we wield power? How do we treat “the other?” What love is acceptable? Would changing the past make the present better? How could changing the present make the future better?

Snappy. Spicy. Sci-fi-y. 3.75 stars.